Siege of Siena (1494)

The Siege of Siena was a siege battle of the Italian War of 1494-98 that occurred when King Charles VIII of France's invading French army besieged and sacked the Italian city-state of Siena in Tuscany. The condottiero Pandolfo Petrucci failed in his defense of the city, whose population was massacred after its fall.

King Charles amassed a large army in Volterra after plundering that city, and he received reinforcements from Florence and Volterra as he made preparations to besiege Siena, the next city-state in the path of his conquest. Charles' 819-strong French army, equipped with heavy cannon and organ guns, began its assault on the city on a misty day. The French artillery savagely blasted the walls of the city, destroying several sections of wall and exposing the Sienese defenders to artillery fire. Sienese fire archers destroyed one of the organ guns, but the artillery continued firing until they ran out of ammunition. The French cavalry proceeded to charge into the fray, with the pikemen marching slowly into battle. The French succeeded in overwhelming the Sienese forces, forcing them to retreat to the piazza. There, they made a desperate last stand, and the tide of battle turned several times, with the French suffering heavy losses (including almost all of their knights). However, the French succeeded in destroying the Sienese resistance, and the city capitulated. Angered by Siena's fierce resistance, King Charles had 5,355 civilians massacred in order to instill fear in the populace, only to rebuild and refit the city as a base for his armies in central Italy.